


shattering glass with a fist

by 1derspark



Series: D's tumblr prompt fics [2]
Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Betrayal, M/M, Missing Scene, Prompt Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-09
Updated: 2020-08-09
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:34:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25807465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1derspark/pseuds/1derspark
Summary: “I should string you up by your intestines and let the crows have you,” Joe spits in his face.“You should. Much like Prometheus,” Booker says in that poetic way of his.Joe laughs, hard and cold, just on the brink of shattering. He thinks of Nicky strapped to the table, pieces of him cut off and stored in gel-filled jars as one does for a kidney stone.“No,” he says. “Prometheus suffered for something. You suffer for only yourself.”(Tumblr prompt fic #2)
Relationships: Booker | Sebastien le Livre & Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Series: D's tumblr prompt fics [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1871440
Comments: 28
Kudos: 244





	shattering glass with a fist

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! This is for tumblr user somethingmeh-blog who asked for:
> 
> “I've yet to see anyone write out a tense fic of when Joe, Nicky & Booker were coming down in the elevator going after Merrick. I'd just love to see some dialogue from a furious Joe and then maybe cut to some reassuring Nicky comforting Joe? Totally up to you x”
> 
> Soooo I watched where this scene would start in the movie like five times and I don’t think they go down in the elevator? I’m pretty sure they’re just running after it cause it’s already going down. (Unless I’m reading the scene wrong) but I definitely do think there would have been some harsh words exchanged as they went. So that’s what I’ve done! Hope you enjoy :)

It’s fifteen flights of stairs they run down, leaping, jumping, practically flying over each landing, Merrick a carrot on the end of the stick they just can’t fucking catch.

When they reach the lobby floor Joe has his hands in the doors of the elevator prying it open, while Nicky’s over his shoulder with a gun trained straight for the target.

When it opens, Nicky shoots, but its not Merrick.

Joe crouches down to inspect the body of what seems to be a cowardly Merrick Industries goon, a bullet sticking out of his temple, dripping onto the pristine white floors of the elevator. 

“ _Fuck_ ,” Joe curses. Kicks the body then throws a fist at the elevator door, doesn’t even register the cracking of the bones in his fist. They’ll come back together in a second.

“He must still be upstairs,” Booker says from behind them, a hollow panicked look in his eyes. It’s guilt Joe realizes, and it makes his blood boil.

He has Booker by the collar before he even fully registers it, pushing him up against the wall, teeth bared, and his face wild with rage. Nicky’s yelling at him from behind but for the first time in centuries, he doesn’t stop to listen.

“I should string you up by your intestines and let the crows have you,” Joe spits in his face.

“You should. Much like Prometheus,” Booker says in that poetic way of his. The French soldier, deserter, lover of football, and good whiskey. Booker, who will sit at a windowsill when given free time and read Tolstoy and Hugo and Homer. Booker is a revolutionary, a man of valiant battles, who understands the price a man pays serving tyrants. How has Booker forgotten this? Or maybe it is Joe who did not see. Two hundred plus years on this Earth and Joe thought he knew enough about the man he called brother to trust him. 

Joe laughs, hard and cold, just on the brink of shattering. He thinks of Nicky strapped to the table, pieces of him cut off and stored in gel-filled jars as one does for a kidney stone. 

“No,” he says. “Prometheus suffered for something. You suffer for only yourself.”

“I’m sorry,” Booker says. And it might be genuine, but it’s not enough.

Joe clocks him in the cheek, watches blood spill from his mouth, and is happy for it. But then Nicky’s dragging him back by the shoulder, firm.

“Stop it, Joe, enough!” he says, sounding cross. He holds Joe away from Booker who’s slumped down against the wall, wiping blood from his mouth and spitting teeth out onto the floor.

“This solves nothing Yusuf,” Nicky says taking Joe’s cheek and making sure hears it. His eyes burn, anguished and Joe knows he is not the only one thinking about jars filled with skin, the pain of having watched the doctors take it. Nicky was awake first after all.

But he is not like his Nicolo, who can so easily put aside that anger to unwrap later at a more convenient time. That’s the way Nicky is, he hoards his emotions inside the way a dragon does gold and brings them out whenever they are most needed. 

“I would feel better,” he admits, every word punctuated with truth. He’d like to take to Booker with his scimitar and hack and hack for more than a few hours. What would it solve? Nothing, Nicky is right. But he’d have a punching bag for his grief. He thinks Booker would let him. 

“That is temporary my love,” Nicky says. “We must focus on the permanent, the now. And Andy is upstairs about to be laid to rest.” Joe hears the unsaid. 

_We have to save her._

Booker is watching them with wary eyes, he’s cleaned himself up enough, but hovers unsure as to where he fits. It’s not as unfamiliar a stance as Joe might expect. He realizes with a sudden pang of grief that Booker has felt unsteady and unwelcome among them for decades. 

It stokes his anger too, but Nicky told him to put that away.

Joe nods and they move to head back upstairs but then the floor rumbles and everything whites out for a second in the unmistakable sound of shattering glass. 

They freeze, and outside car alarms go off. 

There on the wreckage of a car parked on the curb, Joe can see the crooked wreck of Nile’s hand sticking out from the top.

“Right. Let’s go,” Nicky says to them both, with no room for argument. He hooks his gun into a holding position in his hand and heads for the door.

Joe and Booker share a long look for only a moment, it says so many things.

_How could you?_ Joe wants to say. _How dare you? You let Nicky get hurt, I will never forgive you. You are my brother Booker, I sat with you and drank and smiled and we laughed at the foolishness of the world together, how wise we are in the face of it._

Booker’s face says it all.

_What would you know of the weight of all these years alone? You and Nicky always had each other, right?_

Booker runs into the street, and Joe follows, too much and not enough left unsaid.

**Author's Note:**

> Come check me out on [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/1derspark)! I'm accepting prompts and fic ideas at the moment, or just come and say hi :)
> 
> As always kudos and comments are loved and feed the beast!


End file.
